


Got this curse in my hands

by ninhursag



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Branding, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Abuse, M/M, Masochism, Needles, POV Outsider, Scarification, Scars, Tattoos, Trauma, Young Leonard Snart, Young Mick Rory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-17
Updated: 2019-06-17
Packaged: 2020-05-13 06:18:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,628
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19245526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ninhursag/pseuds/ninhursag
Summary: In which Len works with a body modification artist/tattooist on his scars. Outsider pov.Len and Mick are both in their early 20's. Mind the tags but neither violence nor sex are 'onscreen' just implied.





	Got this curse in my hands

**Author's Note:**

> For h/c bingo round 10. 
> 
> Prompts: needles, branding
> 
> I'm fairly sure this is something that happened in the [ Possessive Charms](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1358728) series but you don't have to read that to read this or vice versa.
> 
> A hurt comfort story for a character who can't figure out how to accept comfort.

He's a young man, the first time she sees him, maybe 20, maybe not even, but at least ten years younger than she is. He has that careful swagger boys can get when they're coming up in a rough neighborhood and a little too pretty to look at. And he is, all blue eyes, long lashes and high cheekbones with the sort of mouth you could have wet dreams about. 

He also has that careful way of looking over his shoulder that says he's probably done time already.

Still. He grins at her with that mouth of his and leans all over her nice clean counter, letting his body take over her space. "You Ella? I heard you do good work." He has a nasal drawl, like a particularly affected townie kid, but she finds out later he doesn't always use it.

"Oh yeah? Well I don't do take on gangbangers or family assholes, they screw up my work or don't pay, so I don't know who told you that," she says and rolls her eyes. Waits for him to tell her off or get mad.

His smile widens instead and he leans in a little closer. Not quite close enough to touch, she notices. He'd be able to duck out of any attempt to reach for him. "No way. How do you stay in business if you turn away half the neighborhood?"

"I charge what I'm worth," she says shortly. Steps up a little, just a tiny bit closer to him, and watches him ease back just exactly that much. Just enough to keep the same amount of space he'd allowed between them. "And again, I don't do gangland crap."

He shrugs, all elbows, projecting easygoing vibes with all his might. "That's ok. I'm not a banger."

"Or mob crap," she adds, sharply. But she's starting to realize it's not that.

Still watching him. He smells like sweat up this close. Not stale, he's washed, but enough that you can smell that it's at least eighty degrees out and he's wearing at least two visible layers of long sleeved shirts, jeans and boots, covered up from neck to wrists to feet.

"Do I look like I'm family?" He mutters. He doesn't exactly. He's a shady looking kid, and she'd buy a gang maybe, but he has the wrong kind of smarminess for foot soldier work and absolutely zero subservience. And he'd be dressed a lot nicer if he were a higher up.

"I don't do charity work either," she says. 

He rolls his eyes. "Peachy, because I don't take charity. I heard-- look, Angie F. says you do good work. But if my money's not good enough for you--"

And Ella sighs, because that was going to be her next guess and it wasn't what she wanted to hear. Not another one of those. But she says, "right, well you should have led with that, kid."

Angie Forestal was an old friend, one who supplemented her social work gig bartending. She'd send the regulars who needed Ella's help from both places 

He makes a face, pretty mouth twisting into a sneer. "I'm not a kid. I'm not a charity case. Angie said you knew what you were doing."

Ella sighs and rubs her eyes. This is going to suck, she can tell. "Ok, come to the back with me and let me take a look at it and I'll give you an estimate on how much work it'll be and how long it might take."

"The back?" he repeats, blinking and drawing back a step. 

She makes a face and gives him another careful once over. Tries to map out her approach. He's responding ok to gruffness now. It might put him off if she switches it up. "Listen up, not a kid. If you want me to cover it I'm going to need to see it. And I'm going to take a guess you don't want to strip off and show me where someone can walk in off the street?"

The blank, empty look she gets at that makes her sigh. It's only for a moment, but she's seen people lose their thread like that before, suddenly there but not there. Dissociation is what Angie calls it. Then he's back, and irritated (scared) about it. "Yeah, you know what? Maybe I'll just pass on the whole thing. Sorry to waste your time."

Angie definitely found him at the bar. Ella frowns. "It's ok, Mr not a kid. Think of me like the doctor? I seen it all and it'll fuck up my rep if I go blabbing it."

He puffs out a breath and looks amused, nerves tamped down and covered up. "Docs and tattooists, huh? And my name's Len, by the way," he says and doesn't walk out. So that's a win, since apparently she's doing this.

He startles a little when she leads him into the back and locks the door behind them. The wince is small but obvious when the lock clicks. She shows him her hands, backs up so he can see the door will still swing open easy from the inside and doesn't otherwise say a word about it.

"Come on, Len," she says, still gruff. "You ever had ink done before?"

He makes a face. "Kid with a pen in juvie offered but it seemed pretty unsanitary. And Karl Oakley down the street offered to do it for a blowie but I guess he didn't hear he was supposed to be like a doc."

"Dude's a wrinkly asshole. I'm guessing, I ain't never seen it," she says and he grins at her.

"Yeah no thanks," he mutters.

His hands shake on the hem of his shirt but his face doesn't show it. And she figures it for courage. There's a lot of that in this kid, under the swagger.

She manages to keep her face impassive when she sees the extent of the scarring. He meets her eyes, defiant, daring her to react.

Angie has sent her all kinds, domestic violence or self harm usually, some human trafficking survivors, one refugee woman who'd been an escapee from a South American prison. Plenty of people who should have been seen by a plastic surgeon, not a body modification artist.

This wasn't close to the worst one but it was bad enough. A cross between domestic violence with at least a stab at outright torture. They'd spared his face and hands, whoever had done it, it started with the forearms. Someone who was worried about getting caught.

She doesn't touch him and waits until he puts one of his shirts back on before she says, "I'm going to be honest with you, Len. We can talk about covering some of that, but I ain't a plastic surgeon. There's no way it won't be obvious what kind of shit happened."

He makes another face, mostly with the movement of his mouth. His perfect, untouched mouth. And that's sinister in and of itself, the contrast. The way that they'd been able to restrain themselves, because some of those marks and scars on him were so old and he wasn't old at all.

"I'm not looking to erase it," he says. His fingers twitch. "I just-- I want it to be mine. Not something someone did at me. If you can't help me..."

Ella sighs. "I can try."

So they do. They start with ink. He's got a good hand for sketching himself and a few ideas. 

Cigarette burns form the basis for stars in a constellation. Aquila the eagle. The phoenix. Serpens the snake. 

Len likes that. The planning part and the drawing part.

He likes being tattooed also, a lot more than she'd expected with how damn uncomfortable just the act of showing skin makes him. The way he flinches from her hands like it's reflexive.

He doesn't flinch from the needle or the machine at all. Grits his teeth a little when she starts the outline, but he's steady enough, not wincing. Obviously he knows pain and this isn't close to what he can take.

Then… it's rare but, she's seen that response before, where the pain transmutes to something else, but it's clearly a shock to him that he has it. The dull burst of hurt and then whatever endorphins it releases, like a shock to the system that makes him gasp. He's breathing a little harder before too long and flushed a dull red. 

She takes a pause to make sure he's ok.

He stares at her, wide eyed, pupils blown when she asks. "Um," he whispers. "Yeah. Feels good. Uh."

She almost smiles faintly and shakes her head. "Don't worry, some people like it," she says. "It's ok."

"Oh wow. Yeah? Shit," he mumbles. "Sorry."

"It's really ok," she tells him, smothering another smile because he wouldn't appreciate it. "Consider it an agency thing. You're taking your body back- why not that too?"

He buries his face in his hands and mutters something incoherent. 

"Seriously, no one has to know. And maybe next time we do some work, you can bring someone with you? Do you have a girlfriend? Boyfriend? Take advantage."

He blushes even harder and doesn't say a word until they're done.

The next time they do work, Len does brings someone with him. Another kid, maybe a few years older. Bigger too, jacked, with a bulge like he might be packing heat or at least wants everyone to think so and looking exactly like muscle, the kind that she'd normally send packing unless it was one of Angie's projects.

This kid has scars too, visible burn marks, but they don't seem to bother him much. He's wearing a raged wife-beater shirt and long shorts, comfortable in the heat.

He gives Ella one up and down glare and then dismisses her. She knows he sees a small woman, too old for him and not particularly attractive. Certainly nothing compared to his blue eyed, fair faced friend, if you were inclined toward boys.

Len is easy with him though, hanging close, in his space. Calmer, more relaxed. So Ella just shrugs and asks, "he waiting outside or coming back with us?"

Len looks at his friend and shrugs. "Outside, I guess," he says after thinking about it. "Thanks, Mick."

They do thorns and feathers over Len's left shoulder, where a belt buckle had left visible raised scars. It'll take more than one session to finish and Ella wants to wait to make sure the scar tissue will absorb the ink before they go further.

Len's red faced and unsteady by the end of it and just thrusts her fee at her before practically running out and stumbling directly into his friend. "Hey, Mick," Ella hears him whisper.

"Hey Lenny, ok. Heeey," Mick stares, like whatever he's seeing is new to him. Eyes wide, mouth a little open. One arm goes around Len's body, probably by instinct, since he's so close. They don't quite kiss.

Len half drags him out, fingers curled in his belt loop, eyes all pupil. Ella hopes for their sake they have somewhere nearby to go. They don't mention it again.

 

The ink turns out ok on the scars, but not as good as either of them was hoping. 

"How do you feel about brands or scarification?" Ella asks him. "It's a little intense, but we already know how your skin holds scars and you have the pain tolerance for it." 

Len frowns and scratches his head. "Like, what, with a hot iron?" he asks. "Like brand the witch medieval shit?"

She shakes her head and laughs. "Something way more controlled than that. I'll do cold branding sometimes. Or cutting. But same idea-- some more direct modification of the scars."

"Should I think about it for a while?" he asks and she nods firmly.

"You'd better. It's a lot more permanent than ink. You will need a surgeon to get rid of it." She gives him her best serious stare 

That makes him roll his eyes and shrug, old anger carved in the lines of his body. "Who cares, Ella? I'd already need a surgeon to be able to look normal. It's not like I had a chance to think over if I wanted to be a scarred up freak to begin with." 

She has a lot she could say, but she settles for, "I'm your tattooist, not your shrink, Len. I ain't touching that with a ten thousand foot pole."

 

The next time, once they've talked over the design and technique and settled on a placement, Mick comes in the back with him. He looks mildly grossed out and also fascinated. "You're really going to brand him like a cow?" he asks her.

She laughs and Len laughs with her. He's comfortable here now, something in him relaxed and open. 

"She's going to do it with a scalpel first, actually," Len says. 

He strips off his shirt with a hard won casualness that's actually just courage. That's the part that always gets Ella about him, about the ones like him she sees. How hard this is. It shouldn't be, but someone did this to him as deliberately as she was working with him now to undo it.

She's a little worried about the audience, but Mick's mostly fascinated by the process and patterns she makes and doesn't interrupt.

The pain is clearly intense enough that Len seems to zone very quickly. He's not even aroused like from the tattoo, just far away, glassy eyed and still under her gloved hands and scalpel while she rebuilt carelessly inflicted scars into something beautiful. She rubs in the ink afterwards, for the color.

Len takes a while to drift back and there's a vague, confused look on his face like he doesn't know exactly where he is. He's calm enough about it, just shivering a little like he's cold, mostly focused on Mick, who focuses back. 

Ella gives him written aftercare instructions, knowing he's already stocked up what he'll need. Knowing he isn't really listening to her right now anyway.

"Keep him warm. Give him plenty of fluids," she tells Mick. "And-- watch out for him?"

Mick gives her an annoyed frown. "Yeah, I'm watching out for him. As much as he lets me, lady."

But he takes the bottle of juice she tosses at him and makes Len drink it before ushering him home.

 

Len comes back about six months after they'd decided they were done for now. He's alone, with a bruised face, pain and exhaustion in every line of his body. 

"I messed up your work," he tells her. "Just like you said I would when I first came in." His voice sounds worn threadbare. Screaming will do that to you.

"Life happens," she replies. "Especially with your thug life crap."

He makes a face and doesn't say anything.

"Where's Mick?" She asks, hoping it wasn't-- that she hadn't read that one wrong. That it wasn't that type of domestic violence.

It's a relief when he makes a face and mutters, "he's on month eleven of a one year stint at the Heights. He's going to be pissed about this when he's out."

She nods quickly. Then on to business. "We'll have to let it heal fully before we can do anything with it," she warns. "See if and how it scars."

He mouth curls into a sneer, "you haven't even seen it. Maybe it's a paper cut and I'm just being dramatic."

She just looks at him. "Whatever you say. I already know you'll be keeping me in business for a while."

And maybe he looks a little less tired and he smiles at her. Sometimes she just does the best she can.


End file.
